Post 26/11 attacks, 10 new Pak terror camps

Islamabad isn't just dragging its feet over investigating Hafiz Saeed, the brain behind the 26/11 attacks. It is also scaling up terror infrastructure aimed at India. The Multi-Agency Centre counted 62 camps ahead of Home Minister P Chidambaram’s visit to the US. Varghese K George and Aloke Tikku report. Saeed grounded?

Islamabad isn't just dragging its feet over investigating Hafiz Saeed, the brain behind the 26/11 Mumbai attack. It is also scaling up terrorist infrastructure aimed at India.

Intelligence agencies have told the government that Pakistani security agencies are increasing the number of terrorist training schools they run in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

India knew of 52 camps on Pakistani soil last year, around the time of the Mumbai attack. “Ten more have come up in recent months,” a senior government official told HT.

The Multi-Agency Centre — the Intelligence Bureau hub with representatives from all security agencies — counted 62 camps ahead of Home Minister P. Chidambaram’s visit to the United States earlier this month.

Chidambaram is understood to have shared details of the camps, along with maps and intercepts of conversations between terrorists and their Pakistani handlers, with the US government.

The US was also given details of the 260 infiltration attempts this year. Ninety-one terrorists have been killed so far this year. Ten have been arrested.

Intelligence agencies have also reported that 199 terrorists infiltrated in the first six months of the year, up from 117 in the same period last year.

“We focus on Saeed as he symbolises Pakistani inaction,” said the official, who refused to be named. But, he said, the problem is larger and reflected in the rise in the number of training camps and infiltration bids.

Security officers who came face-to-face with the infiltrators say they move in groups of six to 10 and are well trained and equipped. “They seem as well trained as the ones who attacked Mumbai,” a Border Security Force officer in Jammu and Kashmir said.